In the Future, will PPA be giving the Certification Exam via Internet?

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In the Future, will PPA be giving the Certification Exam via Internet?

My wife and I operate a working photo studio from our home in Northern Minnesota (4 hours north of Minneapolis/St. Paul). We cover an area the size of Rhode Island with 1/10th the population. We both have full time/40 hour a week jobs and the idea of driving to some other state to take the Certification Exam doesn't sit well. Certification has been in our minds since I left OIP&T in Dayton, OH four years ago this June, but the business keeps us very busy. What's a working professional to do???

As far as certification, how would we procter it? Certification now has guidelines and I can't see how we'd properly administer the test over the Internet.
Our exam now follows NOCA guidelines. The same folks that oversee CPA certification. Would you trust an accountant that got his certification over the Internet?

I can understand your problem, but I'm afraid I don't see a solution other than getting to a certification site.
But good try <s>

Maybe the rules have laxed, but aren't you supposed to be a practicing photographer for 40 hours a week before you certify? That's how it used to be when it first started.

Michael

Michael Gan,M.Photog.Cr. CPP,Meritage House of Photography

If your business depends on you, you don't own a business-you have a job. And it's the worst job in the world because you're working for a lunatic... You can't close it when you want to, because if it's closed you don't get paid. You can't leave it when you want to, because if you leave there's nobody there to do the work. You can't sell it when you want to, because who wants to buy a job?—Michael Gerber

C.P.P. requirements

Hi Jim;

I'll assume that you ARE a member of PPA. That's the 1st step. I agree that, the last I knew, you had to be a full time studio photographer for 24 months.

If you met both of those ... have you looked at the list of certification liaisons for the one(s) closest to you as well as when & where the give the exam. I'm liaison for Pennsylvania and give it four times a year near the state capitol.

I agree that you will never see it as a net test. The proctor watches during an exam to make sure answers are not looked up. If it were available on the net we would see people getting 100% correct. So look for the liaison nearest to you. Call PPA on Monday and ask for certification to have a test made up for you for the next testing in your state. Good luck.

I agree that it would be nice -- but realistically, I'll agree that an online certification exam isn't possible.

Professional photographers working on their certification aren't the only ones who have to travel to take certification exams. My husband is an insurance agent and in order to become certified, he had to travel at least several hours to the test location. On top of that, he had to take a week-long class (8-5 daily) before taking the test. So, I guess I'll say we have it easy -- we don't have to take a week-long class, stay at a hotel during that time, and then take the test right afterwards (or travel back another time to take the test at a later date.

I haven't found my state offering any tests in the near future, so I would also be required to travel quite a distance to take the certification exam, but my husband's experience with his certification requirements has made me a little more grateful about the relative convenience of PPA certification.

Test in Pennsylvania ..

Hi Betsy;

I'll be giving the C.P.P. test in Camp Hill, Pa., (next to the state capitol of Harrisburg) on April 23rd at 1:00PM. So you are welcome to come take it here. You must 1st set it up with PPA ... and then let me know. So it's not a trip for just that ... check out our state web site about the special deal we have going. For $69.00, you can stay and attend the 1st two days of our annual convention with some super speakers, print competition display and a cool party too. Go to www.ppaofpa.org for information.

PPA Certification Requirements?

Michael mentioned earlier that PPA previously required that you were working 40 hours per week before obtaining certification, but no one else seemed to be sure if this was still the requirement.

I've been researching the requirements and studying for the past 2 years to become certified and I haven't come across this requirement yet. Only the requirements for submitting the application, taking the exam, and submitting 20 images for judging.

Since I'm not a full time photographer, I'm interested in finding out if there are other requirements such as this that I may have missed? The source I've been using is CertifiedPhotographer.com.

Certification Requirements

There is no longer a consumer reference or credit check requirement as there was back in 1970's.

There is no longer a requirement that an individual be a full-time practicing professional photographer as there was back in the 1980's.

There is not even a requirement that an individual be a member of PPA to become certified as it was back in the 1990's.

If I remember how it was explained to the PPA Council back at the 2004 meeting in Las Vegas.... several specialty groups and committees were to be spun off from PPA and formed as seperate associations under the new imaging association management umberlla. The sports and events group became IAPEP. There was to be a new association formed to address the needs of commercial and advertising photographers, and the Certification committee was to be re-created as a new photographic certification association.
Certification, is now a new association no longer under the direct control of the governing body of PPA and the requirements for certification have been changed to reflect NOCA (National Orgainzation of Credentialing Associations) guidelines.

While PPA with it's 12,000+ members, is the goliath of photographic associations, it's membership is a drop in the bucket of individuals that make money selling photographic images. It is important that the skills and knowledge required to call oneself a professional photographer be tested and certified, and that the initials CPP be recognized as the standard of excellence in the photographic industry as CPA is in the accounting industry or ASE is to the auto industry.

It is important that the skills and knowledge required to call oneself a professional photographer be tested and certified, and that the initials CPP be recognized as the standard of excellence in the photographic industry as CPA is in the accounting industry or ASE is to the auto industry.
Don Mitchell

I love that.......

Anyway's, to anyone that's still considering taking the test. I suggest to just do it and see what happens. Of course there's some degree of review work to be done but it's not really hard if you sit down and study. Heck, I don't even know how I passed after a wild night at the Golden Gate School campus.

Side bar: Anyway's, Ever since I became certified, I started noticing that there's a lot of anti-certification photographers out there. I think that the reason why they became photographers is that they were not really good or into academics in the first place. Making them taking a test and studing for such a test makes them feel uneasy.

Is it just me or are there really a lot of anti-CPP photographers out there?